Dirty Shoes



Today I am thankful for my dirty shoes and to be running again.

Since I started running again in the Fall of 2010, this last week was the longest break I have taken from running. 6 LONG days. To add insult to "injury" - no pun intended... by the end of the week the weather cleared and sunny days just begging to be run in were taunting me. By Sunday, I decided that 6 days was close enough to the week off that my Sports Chiro recommended taking off and I decided to head out for a slow run of 2-3 miles. I was able to run 3 and was happy about that.. had a couple of times that the knee ached for a few seconds, but then went away so I thought it was safe to continue. Now the plan is to run 4 min, walk 1 min as I increase time and mileage while continuing to do a bunch of stabilizing/strengthening exercises. I was able to run 4 miles today and it felt great.. no pain at all!I am going to reduce my running days until the Rock and Roll Half and just run 3 days a week, cross train 2. I think that will be playing it safe so I can hopefully have a great run and meet my goal of a sub 2:15 Half... McMillian seems to think I could do a 2:07:21 time.. so we shall see....

Excited to be running with my friends on Saturday in honor of Finley - both physically and virtually.. I can't believe it has been 2 years since we first heard those words, "your baby has a condition called congenital diaphragmatic hernia..." "she has about a 40% chance of survival." It hit me yesterday while listening to one of our pastor, John Mark's Solid Rock podcasts finally why we were so blessed... I have heard this verse a million times, but this time it really sank in. We are blessed to BE a blessing. We are so incredibly blessed each day with the lives of BOTH our girls and in a million other ways. I have seem God answer countless prayers for us. The least bit I can do, is to in some tiny way be there for someone else. To extend a prayer for someone else when I know the power in prayer now. To BE the blessing for someone else. God wants to use us. I am so excited about the Ladybug CDH Foundation and the Virtual run on Saturday, and Ladybug Run in August. I really felt all of this has been led by him and can't wait to see where it all leads.

http://finleyanabelle.wordpress.com/2012/03/22/2012-virtual-walkrun-for-cdh-awareness/

Shamrock 2012 - DNF

DNF = Did Not Finish.

Sometimes it's just not your day to run. You can prepare all you want for a race, but sometimes it's just not in the cards.

My hamstring has been hit or miss the last 2 weeks. I did bail out on my scheduled run on Tuesday because it was feeling a bit wonky right away and I thought with the race coming up, I should be conservative and take things nice and easy. Monday was a gym treadmill run, Thursday I did another short treadmill run, and Saturday I did a slow 1 mile, just-loosen things up run. I was fully expecting to be able to complete the 15K today.

So you are thinking that my hamstring must have acted up today, right?

No, friends, that is not what happened this morning. About 2 miles in, I felt a white, hot pain under my entire left knee cap. This was a new pain, in a new spot. It was the kind of hot seering pain that I have learned it not the kind of pain one should run through, because that usually is followed by not being able to walk, or run for weeks following. I got over to the side of the road and tried to stretch through it. Started running again, and it came back. Tried walking for a few minutes, and each time I tried to run there it was. I thought about the next 7 miles and trying to complete the race because I am not a quitter. I hate quitting. I think that is what I feel the worst about... but at the end of the day I had to think about why I run. For fun, for fitness, and for stress relief. If I push through something that is an injury in the making, and am side-lined for weeks or months I am going to be much more upset than if I do the walk of shame back to the waterfront. I needed to look at the big picture and ignore that voice that was making me feel bad for listening to my body.

Sometimes we can plan and train and set our goals - but it just isn't our day to run. Today was that day for me. It is disappointing and frustrating, but there will be other races. There will be Shamrock 2013 (I WILL get one of those bottle opener medals!).

I was a little feeling down and bummed for myself, but then I got home and attacked by two sweet girls, and R asked if I won and I told her I didn't finish because my knee hurt and she just gave me a big hug. I am blessed in so many ways, I am not going to focus on the negative. The Race days are fun - but it's not why I run. I run for the workouts during the week that help keep me in shape and restore my sanity. I run so that I can set a good example for my lovely girls about fitness and making yourself a priority. So today, I am thankful for a body that I know can run 9.3 miles and I know can run that route. It just didn't want to today.

And that's okay.

*** Here's hoping a few days off will heal whatever went wonky today and I can jump back in to my training. So my focus this week will have to be strength training and some cross-training.